


You Can't Go Home Again

by coolbreezemage



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Gen, Post Season 3, Vignette, references to slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-21
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-13 07:22:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28899594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coolbreezemage/pseuds/coolbreezemage
Summary: What does it mean to return home when you or your world has drastically changed from when you left?Three scenes of homecoming across centuries and universes.
Comments: 29
Kudos: 29





	1. Kaminar

Kaminar looks so different now from when Saru left. Only the moon and the sea are still the same.

There are streets and shops and tall gleaming buildings, not an All-Seeing Eye or forager’s hut in sight. Ships sail the sea, shuttles trace arcs in the sky. People walk the streets unafraid, no longer waiting every day for death to come for them. It is so good to see his people thriving, he thinks, even as his eyes scan the horizon for any trace of the world he knew.

The wide stone streets are lined with dark canals. Saru thinks nothing of them as he and his charge explore the capital city. He listens patiently as Su’Kal chatters at his side, talking of things he saw in his holograms and read in books and in Discovery’s databases.

But it turns out there are more differences here than Saru expected.

The first time he sees a Ba’ul emerge from the water, his spines come out before he can stop himself. But there’s no threat. Su’Kal looks at him with surprise on his face and maybe a little hurt, and he’s forced to duck his head in apology, spines aching as they retract.

The Ba’ul pauses, glowing eyes fixed on him, and he shivers under that gaze, thinking of cold, dark ships and tight restraints. Then it - they? to his shame, he doesn’t know - gives him an odd tilt of their head and continues on with their business, splashing away down the canal.

He should have been prepared. He’s always thought himself so tolerant, living among aliens. Now, it seems that’s not so true anymore. 

He only realizes he’s frozen in place when Su’Kal tugs on his arm. 

“They- they are our friends now,” he says, the student now the teacher. “It isn’t like the old stories.” He shakes his head. “They’re not scary!” 

Su’Kal knows he came from the past. Saru will not lie to him, not after promising him honesty. 

“You are right,” he says. “I- forgive me, it was simply a surprise.”

He’d come here to teach a child, but it seems he has much to learn as well.


	2. ISS Charon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Her goal is the only thing that matters. Her throne and her rule and her wayward daughter. That’s why she’s here.  
> And yet, something isn't right anymore.

Philippa sees them, cowering in the corners, waiting and watching and fearing. She’s never truly  _ seen _ them before, not like this.

She shakes her head. Distractions. Her goal is the only thing that matters. Her throne and her rule and her wayward daughter. That’s why she’s here.

And yet. At every timid flicker of a Kelpien face, she can’t help but think of  _ him _ and his damnable gentle voice and the pathetic way he fawns over his crew like a bitch licking her helpless puppies clean. 

They are aliens. Animals. Slaves, nothing more, born for service and for slaughter.

One died today, put down by her fellows before she could be taken by the fever.  _ Was he the one to- _ but she cuts that thought short. Her chef suggests a special meal. Her stomach turns, and she makes some excuse to refuse the treat.

How far she’s fallen. She wants to sneer, to snap orders, to be heeded as her title deserves, but every day it feels more a lie. She is Emperor of a dozen worlds. But what are those worlds worth now? Her domain seems a dark shadow of that messy, bright universe she left behind on the other side of the portal, a mirror to her own in sickening sweetness and brave strength. 

She’s gone soft, she thinks, but then she dispatches a rebel with one flick of her blade and laughs at the blood speckled over her finery, so that isn’t it. What has happened to her? Her instincts, her skills, they’re all still there and sharp as ever, but something aches in her chest as she surveys her conquests. 

Her atoms are no longer at odds with her world, but now her world is at odds with her.

And her world cannot continue like this. She sees it now, all too clearly, the collapse that awaits them if they continue in their arrogance. But what is she to do, when enemies stand arrayed on all sides, waiting hungrily for the slightest sign of weakness?

Michael would know. Not her Michael, her cruel daughter who tortures artists and discards slaves for the smallest of errors, but the one from the other side, the one who goes running off on unsanctioned missions to rescue her friends when they’re in danger. She would know what to do. And she would do it, no matter what it cost her.

Can an Emperor thrown out of time pay the same price?


	3. Ni'Var

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ambassador Spock’s impossible dream, now a living reality before his sister’s eyes. 

At first glance, the streets of Shi’Kahr look much the same as they did a millennium ago. Vulcans are not fond of change for change’s sake, and if what served them well in the past serves them well now, they will leave it in place. 

But it is no longer only the Vulcans who build their lives here now.

Michael watches the pedestrians go quietly by in groups of two and three. The manners are much the same as always, but the faces are different. Vulcans, Romulans, a scattering of other species. A good number of the signs on the buildings are written in both Vulcan and Rihannsu, a symbolic gesture, but an important one. 

Ambassador Spock’s impossible dream, now a living reality before his sister’s eyes. 

She is so, so proud of him. 

It is not perfect. There is still suspicion, tension, she’d be a fool to deny that. But it is progress. And with the curse of the Burn lifted from their shoulders, the people of Ni’Var have space to grow.

She continues down the street, simply watching and listening, taking in this new world. And then she stops in her tracks when she hears laughter coming from the patio of a tea shop. She turns to look in astonishment. No Vulcan of her day would dare make such a shameful public outburst of emotion. But today, she’s the only one staring, the only one surprised. The rest carry on as normal. This unity, once thought illogical, is normal now.

She finds the source of the noise. There’s a pair of women sitting at a table, one a Romulan and one a Vulcan, sharing a pot of tea and a plate of small sweets. The Vulcan says something, making her companion laugh uproariously yet again. And Michael swears she can see a hint of a smile on the Vulcan’s lips.

She thinks of Sarek’s stern, judgmental love, thinks of curses and bombs and the insults spoken so calmly to her and her brother both, and part of her wishes they could have grown up here instead. 

But then, who would there have been to build this future?

**Author's Note:**

> I have a Discord for Disco fic and character discussion! https://discord.gg/bKzEmm552J


End file.
